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Topic: Yamaha TW200.. the swamp donkey (Read 9071 times)

Ive been slacking a bit on updates, but I have still been tinkering around on this thing. I pulled the motor out and finally got the side cases (that a previous owner had graciously decided to use jb weld as "gasket material") pulled off, beit with a good amount of grunts, bloody knuckles and ez outs since ever single phillips head had been rounded off. What I found when I drained the oil was a highly undesirable paste of goo and metal shaving, along with a little more goo, and just when I thought I had found it all, more metal shavings.

Now, after a little bit of google-fu and some forum reading, ive found that these little tw lumps are notorious for shedding metal shavings, and there is a hippy esqe attitude in "the tw200 groups" of shavings are fine, just run it, but even so, there seemed to me an obnoxious amount of them. I figured no time like the present to dig in and see where they are coming from. I wasn't planning on splitting the cases, but I guess plans change. Upon removing the inspection cover for the cam chain, I had a "well theres your problem" moment. The engine was pretty obviously starved of oil at some point and the aluminum cam bushing had been eaten away.

To remedy this I will need source a roller bearing and a new cam. Its been done before and documented, so hopefully wont be to big of a deal.

Not sure I'm ready to give up yet. Entire engine swaps are pretty tricky due to the extreme offset on the countershaft sprocket. There is actually an outer carrier bearing that is part of the sprocket cover. Even a bw350 motor utilized a jack shaft on the swinger, so its not a real easy swap at that. Heads, however are a little easier to come by. I don't have the list handy, but a number of tt225 xt225 xt200 and a few others are direct swaps, and can be had complete with cams, valves and rockers for around $70 used.

That said, if I find a complete better tw200 for a reasonable price, this one will quickly become a parts mule.